Choosing My Attitude

“The question, as always, is what your attitude is towards these awkward moments, these radically disappointing moments in life.” The Art of Pilgrimage, page 142.

I’ve been called to Walk Lightheartedly and with a Joyful Spirit on my pilgrimage, and I’ve been committed to that practice for the last month, since that invitation was inspired through me.

Given that commitment, what is the invitation in those inevitable “radically disappointing moments of life”? Those human moments that we are all familiar with. Those ones like the ones I’ve had today.
My first life coach told me that “Disappointment takes adequate planning,” which I thought was ingenious. It’s a brain twister, but a truth as well.

However, I also feel that it is impossible to live without expectations, as much as we might try to release all of them. And so, ipso facto, some disappointment is inevitable too.

All of the Camino memoirs that I have read so far have spoken to expectations and disappointment in some form. But they have also offered a powerful antidote, and that is the one and only thing that any of us really have any meaningful control over: our response to our experiences and circumstances.

So, today, I am actively and consciously choosing my attitude towards whatever comes my way. It’s my pilgrimage quest for the day. It takes some practice, and it demands my faithful commitment to my choice, so as not to slip down the slippery slope of the indulgence of feeling sorry for myself or the folly of having that conversation in my head about how unfair life can be, or how it should be different in some way.

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